Landscaping

How to Embellish a Sleeper

Embellishment and Durability

The main function of a railway wooden sleeper for landscaping purposes is to embellish the garden. For the sleeper to beautify the garden, it must be in optimal technical and physical conditions. A layer of varnish can be used to embellish and also increase the sleeper's lifespan.

From the past 10 years, in Chile and the rest of the world, UV radiation has grown exponentially. UV radiation is harmful for the skin, but also damaging for wood, shortening its lifespan. In order to prevent it,, Marine Varnish can be applied, either semi-gloss or opaque both with UV filter. Marine Varnish prevents the loss of color and also makes the wood brighter and lighter in color, beautifying and creating a natural landscape on the garden. Varnishing the sleeper once during the year may expand lifespan in 3 years. An instruction video is provided showing all the steps of varnishing a wooden sleeper, in addition written steps are included:

Before varnishing the sleeper, make sure to have all the necessary equipment at hand, and work ideally on a sunny and dry day.

Clean and remove all the soil and dust from all the faces of the wooden sleeper.

Open the marine varnish and the paint thinner recipient.

On the painting tray, mix 50% varnish and 50% paint thinner.

Insert the brush inside the painting tray and start to varnish the wooden sleeper in one of the visible faces.

Repeat step 4 for all visible faces.

Wait at least 8 hours in order for the wooden sleeper to dry, then rotate the sleeper and varnish the non-visible face, which is the one leaning against the ground.

Once completed and the sleeper is dry in all of it’s faces, varnish once more without thinning the varnish, repeating steps 4 through 7.